Day 156 - Upside Down- Chapter 4 - (1734 words)

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UPSIDE DOWN, BACK TO FRONT

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 4

Few Days After

The tie chaffed at his neck uncomfortably. He could feel it bunched up awkwardly under the folded collar. The tie had twisted in his haste and turned sideways against his neck when tightened. He wished he could go back in time and loosen it, fix it and come back, but it was too late.
The service droned on, dwelling on Nixon’s age and the loss of such an influential and generous businessman. Lecturing on the importance of local businesses, hiring locally and giving the less fortunate a chance. Nothing at all about hiring cheap to increase profit. Nothing about being a complete asshole at all.
It was uncharitable to think like this.
I caused this, this is my fault he’s dead. He was a complete bastard, but he didn’t deserve to die. James drops his head and the other mourners assume the situation is getting too much, but for very different reasons. So far no one has acused James of being at fault. Not because of the dog unleashed that locked him in the burning box, but because of the late change to the drivers, the late change that sealed his fate.
The late change.
The unexpected change.
Ivan did not know that Nixon was going to be in the cab, and he said that the door must have fused shut when the fire started. But there are two doors. Two doors that both inexplicably locked. The police had already declared this a tragic accident, they weren’t looking any further. The money was gone, burnt out with the van. There was little left to check. They were happy, the insurance company was happy and Nixon was tragically dead. Dead because he was in the cab.
In his seat, the driver’s seat.
In HIS seat, James’s seat.
Nixon had planned to kill him off. Forget one third. How about half? Take one of the boys out and you get an instant pay rise. What was it he had said about the device? It was controlled, but it would look uncontrolled. It would look random, but it would not be. It would burn out the rear door locks so even if the driver gets out then it’s impossible to save the money by then.
If he gets out? IF?
James feels sick now and his face greens. The funeral speaker is talking about the tragic circumstances of his death. Everyone in the room knows about the radio, what James and the others heard. The gagging sounds of James trying to cope with the knowledge that the scorched fate of Nixon was conincidental, that he was the target, connect with the other funeral goers.
Sympathy with the grieving is not relevant, not nearly as relevant as realising someone wants to kill you.
Someone wants to kill you.
To kill you.
Kill.
You.

The Beginning.

“There’s no such thing as a perfect crime.” James is skeptical.
“I know, the perfect crime is not a crime at all. The perfect crime is undetected. If you look you will find. That’s the problem with covering your tracks, you do that because you know someone is looking for you – right?”
Sam is smiling broadly, like he can hear the punchline coming and cannot wait for it to be laughged by someone else.
“Ok, sure.”
“So we make sure that no one knows the money is gone.”
“I would think that they would notice a half a million in cash is missing.”
“Not of they think they know where it is. Not if they think they can see where it was, where it is, where it should be. They’ll be looking at the left hand and meanwhile?” Sam is waving his right hand vigourously at full stretch from his body. “They’ll never look, because they think there’s only the left hand!”
James nods, but says nothing. He is tolerating the conversation, it’s his best friend but right now he sounds and seems mad.
“It’s not mad, it’s perfect.”
“Sam, I don’t think you understand.”
“James you don’t understand. It’s simple. They see the money burn. Therefore the money is gone. We count our money. We sit on it for a while, we find a way to bank it, invest it or something – nothing too suspicious. We need to not show up on the Tax Man’s radar. We tell people out Lotto came up and we disappear and start again somewhere else.”
“I’m not moving to India dude.”
Sam laughs, and it’s honest and long and this settles James a little more.
“Fuck India man, I was thinking the Gold Coast. We buy into a new development, get in cheap and set up a small business there. Doing… fuck – who cares, we won’t be working for that racist retard of a boss, we can ditch and start again. It’s not a fortune, but it’s enough man. Half a Million in cash, we will be set for a while and as long as we’re not stupid with the money, we can make it work for us.”
James listens to the sales pitch, unconvinced.
“Nixon never fixed the truck. It’s going to burn again, most likely. We just give it some encouragement at the right time. Then it’s piss easy. David, you , me hell even the ambulance driver who took Dave in can all sit up and testify that Nixon’s truck is unsafe. Even if it’s one of the others, he has the same service state on all of them. We can burn any one of the them the same. But we don’t need to … because.”
“Because he’s so predictable right? He always uses his number one truck for Pete’s Wholesale runs. It’s the superstitiousness in him. He’s always going to, until that heap of shit literally falls down around him.” James is warming, seeing the light breaking around him, beginning to feel it on his skin now.
“But we can make that happen, give it a little push and watch it fall down.”
“How do we do that?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“When do we do the swap? Where do we do the swap?”
“I don’t know yet.” Sam is smiling inexpicably.
It is in infectious and James cannot help but return the feeling.
“I must be fucking mad.”
“We must be brother.” Sam slaps him on the shoulder, it’s the first in a while not given in any way other than the way it was received and intended.
“Well fine, do we have an exit strategy? What if it all goes pear shaped?”
“Well…” Sam rubs his chin. “… I don’t know yet, but I would have to say that we can pretty much pull out any point right up until the swap and then it’s kind of point of no return. Let’s say it now.”
“What’s that?”
“If either one of us needs to, wants to pull out. We kill it. We just stop.”
“Any time?”
“Yes.”
“Any reason?”
“Yes, absolutely. You know I trust you man, anything at all goes hinky and we walk away, no harm no foul.”
“No harm?”
“No one needs to get hurt. We’ll know enough to not end up like Dave man.”
James rubs his hair gently, pulls at a few strands one or two at a time while he thinks.
“Are you sure?”
“No, but then I don’t need to be. Any time we se if going south we pull out. Deal?”
“Deal.”
They don’t need to shake.

The Day Before

No. They can see the word on his face. It’s not a complaint, exclamation or a negotiation. It’s a hard stop. A brick wall.
“No.” Saying it out loud is unecessary, they can feel the pressure in the air. A barometric change, pointing to the storm.
“You will do what you’re fucking told.”
“We had an agreement. If either one of us feels it going south, if it goes bad in any way we can pull the pin and the others will drop it.” James is unsure of his ground here, Sam is nodding along with him.
Ivan is in disagreement.
“How many people agreed to that deal?”
“Well all of us, we two. It’s our plan. It’s our job.”
“It ours. OURS. O – U – R – S – Ours, not…” Ivan waggles his fingers teasingly between them and smiles. “.. ours.” His grin is broad, he knows he is in charge.
“We brought you in. You were going to help us.”
“Yeah, you brought me in. For how much?”
“For one third, one third of the, the… uh… split.” James falters in the face of the smile. It’s an odd disagreement, a politicians smile. One that knows more than you and cannot be reaosned with. Whatever you say cannot change that smile now.
“One equal third. That makes us partners. And this partner is pushing ahead. You don’t get to pussy out because your nervous. Grow some balls man. Nerves tell you you’re alive. You’ll want to stay that way. Nervous is good. Alive is good. No one has to get hurt, but imagine if they did?”
“What?” Sam is alert now, is this a threat?
“What if someone gets hurt? So the fuck what? You going to spend any less money? It going to make you any poorer? No, of course not. Harden the fuck up boys, the job is on.”
“James?”
“Sam?”
“Oh for fucks sake. This isn’t play school boys, get you head in the game. If this goes south you owe me a half million dollars. You better fucking get with the program. Half a mill. I’m not letting that go because you’re a fucking blouse!”
James calculates, Sam counts on his fingers. No one is saying that one third of 500 thousand is closer 150, 000 – depending how much the device has costed. Suddenly that hinky feeling is much murkier.

The plan is sound but their partner frightens them more than being caught.